The Children Star

by Joan Slonczewski

  “There’s one good thing about Prokaryon,” Geode reflected. “None of their little creepy-crawlies can grow inside human bodies and make you sick. You’re as toxic to them as they are to you.”

  Rod departed at last and checked that his cargo passed inspection. An hour remained for his one indulgence: supper at the Station lounge. It was a rare chance to be surrounded by adult humans again.

  The lounge was built Elysian style, with rounded nooks that could expand or contract, and tables of nanoplast that shaped themselves to accommodate those who sat there. There was even a tree full of butterflies at the center, for Elysians to meditate. But most importantly, the tables actually served differentiated food. It was all reprocessed, of course, like the packets Rod’s instrument produced for his meals at the colony, but Station’s model could synthesize a thousand different food items, from filet of beef to flying fish.

  First he had to find a seat. The bubble-shaped dining compartments seemed more crowded than usual with miners, surveyors, and researchers. Even two or three news reporters hovered overhead, shaped like snake eggs; some odd rumor must be up. Usually one of the nanoplastic walls would notice Rod and tunnel in to create a new space, but not today. Perhaps the dining hall had reached its volume limit. He paused uncertainly, brushing a whirr off his arm. The few that strayed out to Station seemed less picky about sustenance than those back home.

  He saw a hand waving, next to an empty seat. The stranger motioned him to sit, removing her backpack from the chair across from her.

  “Thanks,” he said. The woman, a simian student, looked vaguely familiar.

  Rod sat down and placed his finger on a small window that read his fingerprint. Choosing what to order was always hard, all the more so since every minute that passed made him feel guilty for keeping himself from the colony. “Shepherd’s pie, with mixed greens.” He usually ended up with his Valan home favorite.

  The woman opened a pocket holostage to play the news from Elysium. Rod never watched the news at home, as it distracted from his prayers. Today’s story was on Prokaryon’s “hidden masters.” Giant tracks had appeared among the singing-trees, in a remote region west of Mount Helicon. Even on the holostage the “tracks” looked more like streambed erosion, but of course there were experts to claim otherwise. No wonder the “snake eggs” were about.

  The tabletop opened, and a plate of steaming pie rose up. The odors brought him right back to his childhood; he could almost hear the gulls calling off Trollbone Point. The pleasure of the first few mouthfuls filled his attention, until the holostage again caught his eye. Another ship of illegals from L’li had tried to crash-land, this time on Elysium.

  The hapless vessel hung forlornly above the Sharer ocean, in which the Elysian cities floated. Elysians had intercepted it, of course, and “repatriated” the passengers. Rod’s fork froze in his hand.

  The woman was watching him. “You came from L’li, didn’t you?”

  He recalled the simian student in the connector tube, staring down at him as he tried to keep a grip on the infants.

  She closed the holostage and extended her hand. “I’m Khral, a microbiologist, just arrived from Science Park.” Science Park, the top Elysian research institute, sponsored fieldwork on Prokaryon. “I’ve joined the singing-tree project.”

  “Welcome,” said Rod, shaking her hand. “I’m Brother Rhodonite, of the Sacred Order of the Spirit.”

  “Oh yes! I’ve heard of Spirit Callers on Valedon. They do a ritual dance before the moon at midsummer.”

  “That’s the ‘Spirit Brethren,’” Rod corrected, much annoyed. “They split off years ago.”

  “I’m so sorry, I don’t know much about Valedon. I’m from Bronze Sky.” Bronze Sky, named for its volcanic haze, had been terraformed four centuries before to settle excess L’liites. Today Bronze Sky was full, and there were twice as many L’liites as before—and Prokaryon was here to settle.

  But Khral also showed ancestry from gorilla hybrids created as slaves on ancient Urulan. Her nose was pushed in with a wrinkle, and her heavy brow overhung her eyes, giving her a permanently serious expression. “You know, everyone gets wrong what I do, too. The students here avoid me. They think I’m here to find a plague, to give the Fold Council an excuse to terraform Prokaryon. But it’s not true.”

  “It doesn’t make sense,” agreed Rod. “Prokaryan microbes cannot live in humans.”

  Khral looked thoughtful. “That’s an interesting question. There are reports of occasional microzoöids isolated from human tissues—and even from nanoplast.”

  “Microzoöids?”

  “We call Prokaryan microbes ‘microzoöids’ because each cell is doughnut-shaped, just like the larger zoöids that roll across the fields. Each microzoöid cell runs its circular chromosome right around the doughnut hole! With their triplex DNA, microzoöids reproduce by splitting three ways down the middle, into three daughter cells.”

  “But they can’t reproduce in humans. We’re too…foreign.” He realized he knew nothing about it, only what the clinic had always told him.

  “That’s right,” Khral agreed. “The few microzoöids found in humans never grow in culture. But if they could exist for any length of time, just long enough to divide and copy their DNA, you’re bound to get mutants. And some day those mutants—”

  “Let’s pray they don’t,” Rod exclaimed. “The last thing we need is an epidemic, with our doctor away.”

  Khral laughed, and her large teeth showed, yet somehow she looked more human. “Never fear. Even our own microbes are mostly harmless, after all; they get a bad rap. But you shouldn’t be without a doctor. Doesn’t Station cover you?”

  “Sure, but they can take days to show up. The mining camps offer a thousand shares of stock to recruit a doctor—we can’t match that. Patella came because is a Spirit Caller. But he just had an accident…” He stopped himself. “We’ll manage. There’s a lifeshaper on Mount Anaeon that we can call.”

  “A lifeshaper? You don’t mean the Sharer, Sarai?”

  “You know her?”

  “I’m trying to meet her. She’s one of the few people with data on microzoöids, most of it unpublished. She hasn’t returned my call yet.”

  That was no surprise. “Sarai keeps to herself.”

  “I would have lots to offer her—the latest strains and methods from Science Park.”

  “If you’re not here to find a plague, what are you here for?” Rod asked.

  “I told you—the singing-trees. Singing-trees are full of microzoöids.”

  “They don’t look sick to me.”

  “Neither do you—and your body carries ten times as many bacteria as human cells.”

  Not exactly a comforting thought.

  “And we exchange bacteria all the time, no matter how much we wash our hands. You can track the same bacteria strains in a family—in mom and dad, kids, even the family dog. You could say we ‘communicate’ through our bacteria.” She grinned excitedly. “That’s my theory: The singing-trees communicate by exchanging microzoöids. That’s why nobody’s made contact with them yet: Nobody’s looked at their microzoöids.”

  So that was it, Rod thought, leaning back from the table. Yet another scheme to reveal the “hidden masters.” “Station’s been pushing singing-trees for years,” he told her. “They’ve little to show for it.”

  “It’s different this time; we’re really onto something. That’s why I’m here.”

  Rod regarded her curiously. “Why are you scientists so anxious to find some high-IQ creature running Prokaryon? Why can’t you just let it be? If someone is in charge, they’ll show themselves once we prove worthy of their notice.”

  “That’s just the point—how do we get their notice? If they’ve mainly studied our bacteria output ever since we got here, they must think we’re pretty dumb.”

  That was hard to deny.

  “I should think you’d be interested,” said Khral. “Without that last bit of doubt about ‘h
idden masters,’ how long before we humans would blast Prokaryon open?”

  Rod thought of the moon glowing red and shrinking by the year. A sense of unease crept up his neck. “The Secretary of the Free Fold would never allow that.”

  “The Secretary’s mate is the president of Bank Helicon. Elysian banks don’t like ships of illegals. Bank Helicon wants to get Prokaryon developed—now, not centuries from now.”

  He would have to run to make his launch time, he realized suddenly. His finger tapped the window; the plates descended as he got up, and a nanobug cleared the crumbs. “We will pray for the president of Bank Helicon.”

  FOUR

  On returning to the colony, Rod distributed a bag of sweets from the lounge. The children crowded around, then all but the twins and Gaea went off to the sapphire mine. Mother Artemis nursed the twins from two of her breasts, while Rod mended a strap of a llama’s harness and tried not to let his foot go to sleep in Gaea’s grasp. “Is it true,” he asked the Reverend Mother, “that the Elysians want to terraform Prokaryon?” He pulled the heavy needle through the thick tumbleround hide. He never had the heart to kill a tumbleround, but one that had died naturally provided enough cured hide for a year’s worth of harness straps and children’s shoes.

  “Some would wish to terraform,” she said. “Too few humans can live here.”

  “So, to fill our colonies faster, they would kill all this?” The singing-trees—the helicoids—so many creations, unique to this world.

  “The Sharers won’t allow terraforming.” The Sharers had dwelt in Elysium’s ocean, long before the Elysians built their cities. “They have Elysium in their power. Their lifeshapers could easily make all the floating cities uninhabitable.”

  Rod thought this over. “But it’s not only up to Elysium. The Free Fold—other worlds could vote to repeal the ban.”

  “Secretary Verid will never allow it.” The Reverend Mother spoke with confidence, for she had once worked closely with the Elysian leader Verid Anaeashon, years before, during the early sentient uprisings. Now Verid was Secretary of the Fold Council.

  Pima and Pomu were scrambling down from the Reverend Mother’s lap. On her skirt a bear came alive and made faces at them; they hurried over to watch and laugh. The laughter of children was worth more than gold.

  “For Haemum, I’ve checked out the New Reyo Branch of the Interworld Free School,” Mother Artemis told him. “Would it meet your requirements?”

  “It’s a good start.” New Reyo was a larger L’liite colony on another continent, where the farming was better. The Spirit Callers had received a cheaper tract in Spirilla.

  “She can enroll at any time. We’ll let her try it out and see.” There was a prayer answered. Mother Artemis added, “I’ve also been thinking of T’kun’s arm. We need to have it checked, to make sure the bone is healing straight.” She paused. “We’ll have to call Sarai.”

  Rod tensed inwardly, but if the Reverend Mother had decided, so be it.

  Their first call produced a stall of spattering light on the holostage. Perhaps Sarai had jinxed her connection again, to ward off offending callers. But after a few minutes, the connection held. The Sharer lifeshaper emerged from the surrounding vines of enzyme secretors and other leafy assistants, all native to the ocean world from whence she came. Her skin was smooth, hairless, and purple all over, from the symbiotic breathmicrobes that stored oxygen for swimming. The effect was especially striking since, according to the custom of her aquatic race, she wore no clothes.

  “You share good timing, Sister.” Sarai’s webbed hand held up a large pear-shaped pod, one of the living instruments of her lifeshaping. “You’re just in time to see me commit genocide.”

  “Good evening, Sarai,” said Mother Artemis, ignoring her remark. “My deep apologies for disrupting your work. Please help us. Brother Patella had a mishap and had to leave us, and now one of our children needs attention. If ever we can return assistance…”

  Sarai plunged the pod into a vat of unknown liquid. “There—a billion microzoöids meet their death, that I may study their chromosomes. Who will sing their deathsong?”

  “The Spirit Callers built a shrine for microbes,” Mother Artemis told her. “For all the microbes killed in the name of science.”

  Sarai laughed. “I should have known.” She waved her hand, snapping her fingerwebs. “What’s your problem?”

  Mother Artemis described the accident, and the boy’s condition.

  Sarai listened. A long-legged clickfly perched on her head to cluck its message, then it flew off again. “Enough,” she said at last. “Bring the boy up tomorrow, and I’ll see him. But remember, if I’m in whitetrance, leave me alone.” The holostage went blank.

  “That’s Sarai,” said Mother Artemis. “Once she sees the boy, she’ll treat him. And Sharers never take payment.” She turned to Rod. “What shape is the lightcraft in?”

  “To land safely on a mountain? No way.” The realization sank in. He would have to travel a day down the zoöid-infested plain with a four-year-old with a broken arm, then cross a band of singing-tree forest, then hike another day up the glacial cliffs of Mount Anaeon, to reach the hanging valley where Sarai lived. Rod straightened himself and turned to her. “So be it. If you’re sure you can manage here on your own.”

  “We’ll manage. You could take Gaea, too, you know; Patella and I were discussing it. It’s high time we fixed her spinal cord.” She paused. “It can’t hurt to ask.”

  Rod was up at dawn to harness the llamas for the journey. Haemum had already fed them, as they groaned toward the rising sun. She packed their provisions, pulling the straps tight, and gave one beast a pat on the side. The llama’s head swayed on its long neck, its mouth a perpetual grin. Haemum looked longingly across at Rod. “I wish I could go with you.”

  He clasped her shoulders. “Haemum, today you will journey much farther than Mount Anaeon. You’ll enroll in the New Reyo School. You’ll visit times and places none of us have ever seen.”

  Instead of Haemum, Chae would go along to help T’kun, while Rod managed Gaea. The two boys appeared, having dressed and fed themselves. T’kun was still half-asleep with his thumb in his mouth, his arm in a fresh sling. Chae would ride one llama with T’kun behind him, while Rod rode the other with Gaea strapped to his back. Gaea was the last to be wakened, changed, and fed. The little girl beamed and clapped her hands at the sight of the llama. “Gaea go ride. Go ride, see zoöids.”

  Rod silently called the Spirit to keep zoöids out of the way. At least the girl was starting out on her best behavior, for nothing pleased her more than to ride with her favorite parent all day.

  “Here,” said Mother Artemis, giving him a map cube. “Even if the trail goes bad, you can’t lose your way.”

  Their hands each traced the starsign, the invisible stars evaporating, yet they lingered in Rod’s heart. The llamas set off and paced down the trail into the wheelgrass, to the east, the opposite direction from where the craft from Station usually landed. Their specially-bred outsized feet made good time on the trail.

  The air was still and clear; the distant singing-trees had not yet awoken, and the helicoids were just beginning to stir. A herd of a dozen four-eyes grazed peacefully to the east, each shape casting a long shadow back from the rising sun. The two eyes awake on top were faceted like rubies. Now and then one of the creatures rolled forward on its suction pads, extending the next of its four hungry mouths. At Rod’s back, Gaea stirred and stretched. “Zoöids,” she called softly.

  Rod pulled the rope and called to Chae. “If anything big comes along, remember to freeze.” Humans neither looked nor smelled like food—unless they ran.

  The llamas soon reached the shore of Fork River, so named because upstream the three major tributaries from the mountains met and fed into it. The water rolled wide and lazy, barely rippling through the loopleaves that drooped over the side from bushes at the edge. A long, dark hydrazoöid undulated beneath the ripples; its body wa
s a torus extended into a tube. Its long fin spiraled around its girth, and it swam like a corkscrew.

  Rod paused. Upstream, the trail was less well kept, and the river cut across several bands of singing-tree forest. He waited for Chae to catch up. Behind him Gaea stirred and stretched. “How are you getting on?” he called back to Chae.

  “Just fine.” Chae traced a starsign.

  From behind the ten-year-old, T’kun leaned outward and craned his neck forward. “Are we there yet?”

  “Don’t be a baby,” said Chae. “We’ve barely started yet.”

  They continued east, along the bank of the lazy river to their right. The mountains now rose straight ahead, their fog melting away, and the peak of Mount Anaeon stood clear. On the trail, wheelgrass had grown up in patches, the tall elastic double-stems sprouting loopleaves, each of which was a snare. The llamas picked their legs straight up and down, but still they would get their hooves caught. No wonder few Prokaryan creatures had evolved projecting limbs. Once Rod caught sight of a whirr-clouded tumbleround, with its long tendril loops stretched at all angles to the ground, like a discarded tire covered with cobwebs. Its penetrating odor reached his nose. Though harmless, somehow the sight of a tumbleround always made Rod’s hair stand on end.

  The hollow voice of the singing-trees arose now, in waves that grew and quieted again. The tones deepened, reverberating even through the ground below. Ahead of the travelers the dense band of forest emerged and grew, resolving into deep violet singing-trees. The singing-trees rose in enormous arches, several times taller than the colony dwellings. Between each pair of “trunks” in the arch, the lower sector dipped into the ground to thrust double-roots deep into the soil. From the top branched multiple arches, sprouting loopleaves. The uppermost arches were flattened into stiff plates narrowly spaced together; these vibrated at the slightest hint of wind, “singing.”

  As the llamas entered the forest, the air cooled markedly, and the path lay free of wheelgrass. The upper canopy cut off most of the light, except for occasional shafts from above as if through a window. The dark arches gave the atmosphere of a temple; one could well believe the planet’s rulers dwelt here. As the wind lessened and the songs quieted, smaller zoöids could be heard rustling unseen. The river brooded beside them, furtive creatures slipping into its depths.