"We must stand," he told his fellow male members of the Council of Five (Five was primarily a male world). "We might fight them."
They reacted as frightened walklings. They stuttered and vacillated and wavered and backed down. And his world was changed, almost overnight it seemed, although it had only been four years since the fleet landed on the frozen wastes and disgorged thousands of aliens, men, women and children.
Still, it was impossible not to be impressed by the purpose. He was firmly convinced that it was against God’s,will, but nevertheless, the idea was inspiring. And already the fabric of his religion had been ripped by the mere revelation that the aliens could, with their awesome power sources, prove that God’s Constant was not sacred. And it was exhilarating, in a way, to work with the aliens. He prided himself on being able to grasp immediately the complicated process of their power source, and he was more than equal to them in other fields. Even the most brilliant among them had difficulty in connecting the loose principles which went into the fashioning of a mires expander; but to give credit where credit was due—he was a fair man—once grasped, the principles swirled around in the alien brain and came out with twists which, once expounded, seemed so elementary that he was ashamed of not having thought of them himself.
Yes, there were compensations. He himself had flown. He, Bertt, the builder, had been forced to admit that he was wrong and he, being the male that he was and prideful of it, admitted that he was wrong. Perhaps newness was not all that undesirable when it produced a machine like the Rim Star II.
Aboard that small vessel, he, along with the man called Rei and the Lady Miaree, had vaulted further from the home worlds than any Artonuee male. And now the combination of converters, expanders, and power which had made the Rim Star II blast effortlessly into deep space, eating distance at a God-defying rate, was being developed to power vast star ships, the size of which dwarfed anything ever dreamed. And that—that vast, unbelievable project—was only the beginning.
In spite of his misgivings and his sadness at seeing his world changed, Bertt could not conceal his eagerness. He considered the nights to be wasted, slept only the minimum number of hours, was at his shop before the Fires cooled in the warmth of the distant sun. More often than not he found Untell there ahead of him.
She was there, alien woman, hair chopped carelessly close to her scalp, fleshy body bent over a work bench, on a morning in the beginning of the year, probing into the intricacies of a mires expander, her eyes reddened by sleeplessness. She had been his work mate for four years, and his revulsion toward her largeness, her alien fleshiness, had gradually changed, first into a grudging admission that the alien had a brain, and then into an admiration which, as the months passed, wiped from his mind all his conscious awareness of their differences. Together, they were changing more than a world.
"You have not slept," he said.
"Didn’t want to lose it," she said, not looking up. "I think we can test as soon as I..." She applied a cold torch, fused tiny contact points.
"The new circuit was satisfactory?" Bertt asked, pushing his arms into his working garment and leaning down, head close to Untell’s.
"Perfect," she said.
"Resistance readings?" he asked, watching her fingers move with a nimbleness which he envied.
She chuckled. "As predicted."
He breathed deeply and allowed himself a smile. He had mistrusted his own figures.
His momentary irritation at finding Untell still in the shop faded before his interest, for if he were right— and it was his theory, developed after having his mind opened through contact with the almost heretical courage and intellectual curiosity of the alien woman—he, Bertt, would have a place in the combined history of the Artonuee and Delanian races. If he were right, he, Bertt, the builder, would also bring further curses down on his head from the priests, for his discovery, if it tested, would open new avenues of thinking which would relegate the vengeful God of the Artonuee to a position even more inferior than She now held.
But Bertt was not thinking of God as he busied himself. He was thinking of the fantastic force held there, within the altered mires expander, in two tiny bits of red-brown metal machined to be exactly a 0.1-inch cube.
Untell assisted as he made the last connections, his blunt fingers less nimble, but sure. Then they stood before the assembled expander and the alien smiled and shrugged.
Permission for the test had already been granted by the Lady Miaree, Overlady of Five. The drone driver was fueled and waiting, an obsolete vehicle not deemed worthy of conversion to the new power source. All test units within the driver had been tested and checked repeatedly by assistants.
Bertt summoned a young male, a bright lad fresh from his Chosen Mother, supervised the careful placement of the expander onto a small roller, rode the roller, with Untell by his side, to the launch pad. It took just thirty minutes to install the expander. It took just under four hours to run a last-minute check on all systems, then, protected behind a thick viewer, they watched the drone fire, lift, and disappear.
When the drone, moving at driver speed and thus taking long, long hours (during which Untell napped and Bertt paced nervously) reached empty space beyond the orbit of Five, he ordered an assistant to report readiness to the Lady Miaree, who had expressed a desire to witness the test. When she arrived, robed in purple, comely beyond his belief, accompanied by the alien, Rei, he nodded to Untell, awake, tense, seated at the main console.
A signal lifted from the surface of Five, flashed through empty space, activated a trigger mechanism on the drone. The altered circuits on and in the mires expander reacted instantly, and briefly measured, a force of six hundred trillion tons—blasting from Bertt’s 0.1-inch cube of metal of atomic weight 63.54—was met by equal force coming from the electrons in an exactly similar cube at the other end of the complicated mires circuit.
It happened so tremendously fast that only instruments could measure.
To the viewers, it seemed that the drone merely disappeared, but during a disheartening post-mortem, the instruments showed a tiny increase in the drone velocity which, upon examination, put the fire back into Bertt’s eyes. The force of the electrons had not, as it seemed, merely ripped apart all the atoms in their immediate vicinity. No. For a millisecond, that incredible force had been channeled. For one tiny moment Bertt’s theory had worked.
Seeing the telltale figures, he looked up at Untell. His face, which had been downcast, brightened. She nodded, understanding.
But the Overlady had questions.
"My Lady," Bertt said, "you can see. For an instant we had it. For a measurable instant we were in control of a force which staggers the imagination."
"Dear Bertt," the Overlady said. He lowered his eyes. He did not like the use of terms of affection. That was a Delanian characteristic, and unbecoming in an Artonuee. "When you approached me on this subject, telling me of the possibilities, I warned you then that we have no time for pure research. We have present capability to fulfill our plans. We must concentrate on the known. Your services are badly needed. The services of the worthy Untell have been sorely missed. How much longer can we spare you?"
A month, Lady. Give us another month. We are so very near." He bowed respectfully.
"No longer, Bertt. In one month the engines will be ready for installation in the first of the giant star ships. In two months, another fleet arrives, and your knowledge will be much in demand as we share our progress with the newly arrived scientists."
"Yes, Lady," Bertt said, shifting impatiently. Red tape, he was thinking.
Bureaucratic thinking. He longed for the peace and quiet of his world as it had been before the arrival of the aliens, altered that to wish for unlimited time and the help of his new friend, Untell. Give them a month, a year, and they would beat God, the bureaucrats, and space itself.
Chapter Seventeen
Evening. A swollen, yellow sun half-high. Five’s South Cold. Desolate. Beautiful. Humidi
ty in the air tinged golden yellow, bursting, flaring, raying the sun’s light into streaks of red-gold fire and shadows on the ice ranging from black to purple and, far away, his movement. He was one of a restless breed. But, oh, Lady Mother, God of Artonuee, he was beautiful.
Lost from view behind an ice upthrusting. A hint of the cold loss of sadness in her until he reappeared, nearing.
Bundled into cold-wear, he appeared to be a furry beast picking his way across the eternal ice, and try as she might, she could not bring her eyes to lower, to study the urgent reports lying on her knees. She was desolated without him. The basic chemistry of her blood cried out for him.
"Lady," she mused aloud, "You are in a position of responsibility." Thus driven, she picked up the first report.
At New Nirrar, on the western equatorial land mass, a clash between two groups of females. Words. Reliable witnesses reported that the Delanian women had first resorted to violence. However, one witness, a reliable Artonuee male, said that the violence was the result of dire provocation on the part of the Artonuee females, who taunted the Delanians as animals of the ancient past, bringing their young into the world bloody and wet with vile body juices.
The Artonuee male, one Bruun, technician, said in his statement: "Seeing that an incident was brewing I, as a responsible adult male, tried to avert unpleasantness. Speaking only logic—" How very malelike, Miaree thought, "I tried to dissuade the emotional women and females from further insults and was rewarded by being called a rather derogatory Delanian name, a name with which we males have become familiar
through the discourtesy of the aliens, a name I choose not to repeat."
For the record, the investigating official had inserted an explanation. Bruun, the technician, was called a cannibal, referring, of course, to the instinctive behavior of the Artonuee walkling in consuming the iffling-preserved flesh of a homecomer.
"At this juncture," Bruun continued, "one of the females rose unnecessarily to my defense, saying words to the effect that I, Bruun, was a respected member of the Artonuee community and not subject to ridicule by creatures who carried their young living in their bellies. Before I could speak, blows were exchanged."
Angrily, Miaree tossed the report aside.
Rei was near. She rose, waved. She keened the love greeting and received, in answer, a loud shout. Then he became interested in a curious ice formation, and she, with a sigh, picked up the discarded report. The females involved were wing-flaunters, of course. She used the term in her mind without censure, for her own wings were outside her cloak.
She dictated recommendations. Extra work tours for the Artonuee females. Punishment to be deemed just for the Delanians by the Delanian local Board of Control.
Next, a request from Plant Seven for a rush allotment of diamond drills.
For the first time in years she remembered her rock, the rock she’d discovered in the asteroid belt so long, long ago. She chastised herself for forgetfulness, for diamonds were in great demand, made a mental note to check her old flight log for the coordinates of the asteroid and to send a driver, priority class, to mine the jewels.
It was amusing, in a way. Once the diamond asteroid had meant only more flight time to her. Now it could aid in the greatest undertaking ever conceived by the best minds of two great races.
A progress report on installation of engines in the first giant star ship, revolutionary engines, engines which were a direct result of her alliance with Rei, the Delanian.
But, Mother God, she was tired. She lidded her eyes. Her head rested on
the velvety cushion of her chair and she allowed herself the luxury of pure idleness. Musing, she remembered Rei’s excitement.
She was taken back, in memory, to Outworld. The first days. The golden flush of joy at their first merge. The splendor of love. Love. A word which was now as much Artonuee as Delanian. Love. A sweet sound on the lips. A touch. The electric stir of fur to the touch of a skinned hand, a hand so strong, so tender. Then, time had no meaning. Then, before the arrival of the first fleet and the nervous confrontation of two separate races, it was only Rei and Miaree and the flood of well-being which his kiss engendered in her and the pleasure of shared knowledge and intimacies and endless days of talk as they sat, or lay, or walked in the Bloom and then, with Mother Aglee becoming querulous in demanding a report, the lovely flight from Outworld to New World and the pride she felt in Rei when he mastered the techniques of flying so easily. It was then, during the long, upwind flight, that he discovered the possibilities. As Miaree and Rei merged into one, so the technology of the two races merged and brought forth not dead-flesh eggs, but a triumph of engineering. For the mires expander and the converters, lowering, as they did, the mass of the flyer, eliminating inertia, fitted with the fusion engine of the Delanians as Rei fitted with Miaree.
When she explained, he fell into deep thought, and suddenly, ignoring the view of New World ahead, he was busily scratching figures and formulas and trying to explain to her that with nearly zero mass a ship could be pushed to twice the current speeds of the Delanian drivers. Moreover, the limitations on the size of a star ship were completely removed. With the new system, a ship could be built as large as technology allowed, as big as a planet.
Changes. Vast upheavals in thought, in the Artonuee way of life. The area of space which could be explored was suddenly doubled. A single technological breakthrough, a single instance of cooperation between races, and a civilization groaned and, in spite of the obstructions of the priests, began a change which would affect every individual on four worlds.
There were times, during the hectic course of a day, when she wished for the old, peaceful times when God was God and the Fires were there, unchanging, eternal, approaching with deadly slowness. She had almost snared the fears of the priests when, with near-silent and awesome power,
the fleet landed on the hastily prepared pads on the out planet, cold Five. They were many in their thousands, and all were powerful. The women, although considered beautiful, were oversized, fleshy. They worked alongside the men in an impressive display of vitality to build dwellings.
It was she who took the problem of combining the flyer with a Delanian engine. Appointed by Mother Aglee as Overlady of Five, charged with coordinating the peaceful integration of the aliens into the life of the planet, she sought out Bertt, explained all to him, asked respectfully for his assistance. To expedite the trial of a new ship, she submitted Rim Star to alterations and, crowded into the small space inside the year, saw the distortions of faster-than-light speed, pushed the tiny ship to light times twenty and looked at the home worlds from a distance which reduced the sun to a tiny, insignificant star lost in the vastness of the galaxy.
She remembered the near revolt of the priest-led males when it was announced that the Delanian fleet was only the first of many to leave the constellation of Delan at one-year intervals. She remembered the all-night sessions of the Council, the heated discussions among the inner circle, the final decision, hastened by astronomical observations of the collisions which confirmed Rei’s warning of impending disaster.
And she remembered how Mother Aglee had wept while announcing the decision.
"This," Mother Aglee had said—and five years later Miaree remembered every word—"is a time of crisis. It is a time for difficult, sometimes terrible decisions. Our talks with the Delanian authorities are now concluded, and to reassure my people, let me say that the Delanians are aware of and have empathy for our peculiar and necessary arrangements of life on our habitable worlds. The sacred groves of The World will not be disturbed by alien tread. The ordered life of New World will not be shattered by uncontrolled settlement of aliens. The beauty of Outworld will be held inviolate.
"Yet, since our races face a common danger, we must not turn our backs on fellow sentient beings. We must make a place for the Delanians in our society, thus enabling us to work together with them against our common doom. It has been decided to allow the Delanian fleet to land on
Five. There, on that cold and inhospitable planet, we will begin our work together."
"It has been said that Five will be changed. I cannot deny this fact. And Five is an Artonuee world, thinly populated though it may be, cold and desolate though it may be. Let those who cry out sacrilege and bewail the coming of the Delanians remember that, save by a quirk of God or nature, it could be Artonuee fleeing from the Fires of God, seeking haven. And let us remember that the Delanians come in peace, seeking only our friendship, our help, our cooperation in working together to escape the destruction of our worlds."
"I am able to tell you, at this time, that two of our fellows, a Delanian and an Artonuee, working together as we must work together, have made possible a dream. It is obvious to all that the Delanians have mastered star travel. Yet they are limited, to a degree, by God’s Constant. This mutual discovery by members of two cooperating races has, in effect, doubled the range and the speed of the Delanian light ships. Let us remember, as we hope the Delanians will remember, that it was Artonuee technology, combined with their own, which made such a giant leap forward possible."
Changes. Necessary changes. In order to produce synthetic foods, the Delanians needed certain raw materials. A portion of the Artonuee fleet of drivers was required, while plans were being drawn for the construction of new drivers, new factories. Artonuee scientists were at first uprooted from their dwellings near the Research Quad and flown to Five to consult with the Delanians. Then, with an absence of equipment on the cold planet, with the meeting of the two races proceeding smoothly, Delanians were allowed on New World to work in the Quad with their Artonuee counterparts. Delanian botanists were escorted to Outworld. After an angry meeting of the Council, a Delanian scientist was given permission to study the feeding habits of the ifflings on The World. The Council of Five appointed two Delanian representatives. The two races worked together in harmony, coming closer, ever closer, but not without clashes. When the second Delanian fleet, carrying twenty thousand male workers, arrived on Five, crowds of alarmed Artonuee males paraded past Government Quad. But the decision had been made. The twenty thousand workers were welcomed, for the drain on Artonuee manpower was severe, the demand for raw materials ever increasing as work proceeded on the building of the first huge star ships. The colony of Delanians on New World numbered over two thousand after the arrival of the second fleet, doubled with the arrival from deep space of the third fleet in the third year following Rei’s arrival. Three thousand Delanian men on New World began to contribute to the most profound change in Artonuee life.
The Legend of Miaree Page 11
