Footfall

by Larry Niven

  "Pause that. Koolpooleh, is this nothing but mathematics?"

  "I have no trouble reading the Line Thuktun, Fistarteh-thuktun. Simple plane geometry, a list of axioms."

  "Go to the next one."

  "The Breaker has arrived with trainees."

  "Ignore them. Pause that!"

  Koolpooleh and Paykurtank were watching the humans, furtively, with one eye each. Fistarteh-thuktun pretended not to notice. Perhaps they could learn from watching the aliens. Perhaps not. The fithp warriors were even now aground and dealing with the prey.

  Fistarteh-thuktun remembered what it was like to run, to take prey from a rushing stream, to see nothing but mountains in the distance and clouds overhead . . .

  These creatures must first be defeated. Surely the knowledge was here! All knowledge was contained in the thuktunthp.

  The Life-Thuktun was surely interesting enough. The script and diagrams dealt with biology, and Fistarteh-thuktun had studied it before. Hierarchies of plant life to the left, animal life to the right. Tiny, ancient single-nucleated life at the bottom, scaling toward complex warm-blooded air breathers at the top. Simple sketches at every level. The sketch that was third from the top resembled a stunted fi’. It was bulky, flat-skulled, with but one branch to its trunk. The feet were clubs, each with a tiny afterthought of a claw.

  The creatures sketched above the proto—fi’ were extinct, though skeletons had been found preserved in soft sedimentary rock. Other pictured life forms had disappeared too, but . . .shouldn’t that top sketch be the lineaments of a Predecessor? Wouldn’t they have considered themselves the top of the ladder of life? Wars had been fought over that question, too.

  It was not easy to ignore Tashayamp, half an octuple of soldiers, and four of Winterhome’s small, flat-faced natives, including one in a wheeled cage. Fistarteh-thuktun could hardly fail to hear Takpusseh lecturing them in baby talk. He let himself glance at the humans. They didn’t resemble that top sketch in any way. Fistarteh-thuktun felt a relief he would not let himself admit.

  Since his revival from the death-sleep, the priest’s position had never been stronger. The average fit’ aboard Message Bearer had no grasp of what the Predecessors were all about, or how much Fistarteh-thuktun didn’t know.

  But he had a task. He must advise the officers. He must seek any relevant information left by the Predecessors.

  He had Koolpooleh’s attention again. "Go on," he said.

  The next thuktun explained the making of aluminum.

  * * *

  "Not known, the shapes of the—" Others? Predecessors? "No pictures of selves. Shape of Predecessor minds, half known." Tashayamp was speaking slowly, and Wes was catching most of the meaning, he thought. He had to concentrate.

  "There were eights of eight-cubed of thuktunthp scattered about the world. The Predecessors"—Tashayamp glanced toward the priest, busy at his huge display screen, and her breathy trumpet of a voice dropped a little—"did not know everything. They did not know that what they did with their machines would ruin the world for them. Maybe they did not know where life would be in the world, after the world healed. They left the thuktunthp everywhere.

  "Not told, things about fithp, things about Predecessors. Perhaps thuktunthp were thuktun"—meaning message here—"to Predecessor children’s children. But Predecessor children were not made."

  Arvid asked, "What happened?"

  "Fistarteh-thuktun knows. I talk to him. Wait." Tashayamp turned away. She stood behind the priest and did nothing, waiting.

  Wes looked down.

  From below, the cradle had blocked some of the script. From above, it didn’t. The sculptors had left a meter or more of margin around the writing; it had worn away unevenly, leaving bulges the cradle arms could grip.

  The script was lost to him. Wes studied the diagrams.

  The patterns in the Podo Thuktun: here a spray of dots in which Wes could recognize the Summer Triangle: a star pattern. There a pattern of curves that might be the magnetic fields in a Bussard ramjet . . . Podo could mean starflight or stars or just sky. Certain words and phrases became clear. He was sure that Thuktun Pushithy meant Thuktun Carrier or Message Bearer. Fistarteh-thuktun was a priest; it might be that he worshiped the Podo Thuktun. He seemed to function as a Librarian too. Loremaster.

  Fistarteh-thuktun had turned from the screen and was talking with Tashayamp, too fast to be understood.

  ‘Not known what happened to end Predecessor children," Tashayamp said. "Perhaps they do not want children because they have destroyed the world. Perhaps they cannot have children." She spread her digits in the pattern Dawson had come to call a shrug: a futile clawing at the air. It meant, "I do not know and do not believe it can be known."

  She turned back to Fistarteh-thuktun. Wes studied the star patterns again. The constellations are nearly the same as Earth’s. Nearly, but not identical. They must be from somewhere near— He shuddered. Can more be coming? No, only one ship was in the films they showed us. "Nearby" is meaningless when we’re talking about stars!

  Fistarteh-thuktun was speaking again. Wes moved closer to listen to Tashayamp translate into fithp baby-talk.

  * * *

  Their quarters had become tolerable as the fithp learned what they liked. The padding over the six walls was no longer wet. Dawson was almost comfortable.

  Dmitri was speaking English. Dawson was ashamed at how glad that made him. I am not a communist. Nobody ever called me that except the goddamn Birchers. But I can’t live alone!

  "They were dying. Wes, did it sound as if they destroyed their environment themselves?"

  "I thought that’s what Fistarteh-thuktun said."

  "But they must have thought some of them would live. Changed. Could it be true?"

  "Do you mean, could the Predecessors be their ancestors? No. There was a thuktun onscreen with a column of biology sketches till Fistarteh-thuktun shifted to something else. Didn’t you notice the sketches? That misshapen fi’ was third from the top. If you were making a hierarchy of life on Earth, would you put humanity third from the top?"

  "No," Dmith said in some irritation, "but I might leave humanity off entirely if I were Christian or some such! Then I might put apes third from the top, if I seriously liked dolphins and whales!"

  "That’s too many ifs."

  "Or a Christian or Muslim might put fanciful angels above him—"

  "For the moment, we might as well believe as Tashayamp believes," Arvid said soothingly. "The fithp have studied the subject for much longer than the hour we have been granted. So. A race died of overpollution. The world was changed. In the changed world something new grew up—perhaps a pet or a work animal, an evolved dog or horse. They do seem to worship the Predecessors."

  "Why wouldn’t they?" Wes wondered. "Consider what would happen to tribes who didn’t study the thuktunthp. There were . . . eight to the fourth power is around four thousand thuktunthp, and a lot of them were duplicates. For every one of those, the first tribe—herd?—to use the information would be the first to rule. It must have happened hundreds of times. Of course they worship the Predecessors!"

  Arvid shrugged. "I like to think of them as a tamed elephant. Then the world came apart. Dwarfing is caused by ages of famine. Flash floods winnowed those who could not grow claws to grip a passing rock." He smiled. "There is no proof. Choose the picture you like."

  "Shape wars," Dmitri said. "Is it your belief that these were religious wars based on interpretation of the thuktunthp?"

  "Yes," He shook his head. "Very strange."

  Dmitri laughed. "Why strange? Human history is full of such. The Byzantine Church was divided, and civil wars resulted, from what icons were permitted to be shown in churches. The Christian god has no shape, yet one of the prophets was permitted to see his hindquarters. Not his front, you understand. Only his hindquarters. I do not know if that resulted in wars among the Jews, but it easily might."

  "You’d think there would be some pictures of the Pred
ecessors," Dawson said.

  "Perhaps there were," Dmitri mused. "Only—suppose there were descendents of the Predecessors, and the fithp killed them. It would not be an easy thing to face, that you had killed the sons of your gods.

  One hell of a guilt trip.

  "Or maybe there were pictures of the Predecessors," Wes said. "Maybe they were destroyed as blasphemous, in the period when they thought the Bussard ramjet diagram was the shape of a Predecessor." "Perhaps," Arvid said.

  "And then—excuse me," Dmitri said. He spoke rapidly in Russian. After a while the Russians moved away to their own corner, leaving Wes Dawson alone again.

  They don’t trust me. I might do something to warn the aliens. At least I have a few answers. I need answers!

  * * *

  Nat Reynolds could remember exactly when he got into trouble. It started the second morning after the aliens blew up Cosmograd, ending the science-fiction convention where he was guest of honor, and stranding him in Kansas City. He was sitting in Dolly Jordan’s breakfast room, with good coffee and eggs sunny-side up, trying to think of what to do now that all the stories about alien invaders were turning bloodily obsolete.

  Why couldn’t it have been Wells’ martians? We’d have had ‘em in zoos inside of twenty-four hours.

  "There’s somebody here to see you," Dolly Jordan had said. She set another plate and a coffee cup at the table.

  Nat looked up with irritation. Someone he’d met at the OZcon? But the man Dolly led into her breakfast room didn’t have the look. He was too old (although there were older science-fiction fans) and too well dressed (although some fans dressed well), and what was it? He just didn’t have that sensitive fannish face.

  "I’ve looked all over for you," the man said. "Hah. You don’t remember me, do you? I’m Roger Brooks. Washington Post."

  You’d think the press would know by now: no science-fiction writer can be expected to function before noon. Nat shook his head. "I have a lousy memory."

  "It’s all right. Mind if I sit down?"

  "Dolly already set a place for you."

  Brooks sat. Dolly appeared with a coffeepot. She was plump and cheerful, and smart enough not to chatter in the morning. After she filled Brooks’s cup, she went back to the kitchen, leaving them alone.

  "Why were you looking for me?" Reynolds asked.

  "Because you probably know where the government is."

  Reynolds shook his head in confusion.

  "Just before the aliens arrived, all the science-fiction writers vanished," Brooks explained. "At least all the hard science-fiction writers did."

  "Oho!"

  "You do know something." Brooks leaned forward eagerly. "What?"

  "Nothing real," Nat said. "A month or so ago, Wade Curtis called. Asked where I’d be when the aliens arrived. When I told him I’d be Guest of Honor at OZcon, he changed the subject."

  "And that’s all?"

  "Yeah. Wade wouldn’t ask me to violate that kind of promise. What’s this about the government?"

  "The President left Washington two hours after the aliens blew up Kosmograd," Brooks said. "By yesterday morning, the Cabinet and most of the Pentagon brass were gone." Brooks shrugged. "No stories left in Washington. Nobody there knows what’s happening."

  "So you came looking for me?"

  "Yeah.’ The writers vanished a couple of weeks ago. Then just before the aliens arrived, the President sent an important intelligence officer to Colorado to talk to them. I figure that’s where the government went, to Cheyenne Mountain. Kansas City’s on the way." Roger sipped his coffee. "When the hotel said you’d left with the whole SF convention, I took a chance and came to the chairman’s house."

  "Sorry you went to so much trouble for nothing—"

  "Maybe not for nothing," Brooks said. "Look, the writers are in Cheyenne Mountain, I’m sure of it. You were invited. You have the invitation, I have a press pass and a VW Rabbit diesel with more than enough fuel to get there. Want to pool our resources?"

  I don’t have any invitation to Cheyenne Mountain. I was booked at the OZcon, so I wasn’t invited. All I had to do was say so!

  And I always sign too many book contracts. I have trouble saying no. If I were a woman I’d be pregnant all the time.

  Reynolds stood at a second-story window at Collins Street. The apartment building was separated from the street by a wide grassy strip. The buildings were old brick, with a new McDonald’s just down the block.

  They were in Lauren, Kansas, somewhere near Topeka. He’d never been in the town before, and didn’t want to be here now, but there wasn’t much choice, because while they were driving across Kansas the sky erupted with paper airplanes carrying baby elephants.

  He’d met Carol North at the convention, and his address book showed she lived in Lauren, Kansas. They’d gone to her apartment. We could have kept on driving. There can’t be that many aliens. They can’t be everywhere . . .

  Instead they’d parked in an underground lot and waited.

  The invaders came.

  A ceremony

  , Reynolds thought. It even makes sense. Humiliating, but it makes sense. And once they’ve put you through that, they leave you alone. What do they want?

  Reynolds turned back to the window. In the street outside, three men hid among the trash cans behind the McDonald’s. They’d laid dinner plates on the street surface. From somewhere nearby came the roar of large motors.

  "You had to tell them," Reynolds said.

  "It was a story I’d heard from the Hungarian uprising. How did I know they’d try it?"

  "Bat turds, Roger! George Bergson was itching to kill an alien, so you told him how! You knew he’d try it if it killed him. It will, and we’re too close. What if they bomb this building?"

  Roger Brooks shrugged. "George promised they wouldn’t to anything to call attention to this place."

  "He’s going to get himself killed," Reynolds said. "And probably us with him."

  "Stop saying that," Carol North said. "Please stop saying that."

  "Okay." But it doesn’t change anything. Your friend is doomed, lady. A thought came unbidden. She’d come to his, room at the convention. Her relationship with George Bergson was clearly an open one. Would she be faithful to his memory once he got killed? That could be inconvenient.

  The roaring grew louder. "They’re coming," Roger said. "The snouts are coming . . ." He stayed well back in the room and aimed his camera out toward the dinner plates in the road.

  Two large armored vehicles came into view. They floated a foot or more off the road surface. Their crews were invisible inside.

  It’ll be okay. George will kill some invaders and live through it, and we’ll all learn levitation and fly to safety. Right?

  But Nat’s belly and guts were knotted in fear. He heard Roger say, "It worked in Budapest . . ." The first ground effect vehicle approached the line of dinner plates and stopped. Something protruded from the forward deck and extended toward the plates.

  George Bergson and his friends stood and threw their bottles at the armored vehicles. Two of the bottles hit the lead tank, and burst into flames, Flame spread across the vehicle, and rivers of fire ran off its sides and were dispersed by the ground effect fan. There was a high-pitched whine and grinding noises, and the vehicle fell heavily to the roadway.

  Two more gasoline bombs arced out.

  The second vehicle began rapid fire. Holes the size of baseballs appeared in the buildings behind Bergson and his crew. The men dashed behind the McDonald’s building.

  The gunfire continued, The McDonald’s building was chopped nearly in half. The upper part of the building fell into the lower part.

  From somewhere far above a beam of greenish light speared the McDonald’s building. The wreckage exploded in flame. The green light-pencil drew an expanding spiral around the pillar of flame, first tightly, then in ever-spreading arcs that grew and grew . . .

  Reynolds dived away from the window.

  T
here was the sound of crashing glass. The tank outside continued to fire, and two large holes appeared in the wall in front of him. Carol and Roger Brooks dove into the hallway. Carol lay next to Reynolds. "Jesus," she whispered. "Jesus Christ. They’re killing everybody—you knew!"

  Reynolds shook his head. "I didn’t know, but it was a good guess. Look at them! Herd beasts. No speed, and all their defenses in front, and have you ever seen less than six together? I bet their ancestors stood in a ring to fight. It was a reasonable guess that if someone does something they don’t like, they go after the offenders’ whole herd, not just the individual!"

  The gunfire continued to pound.

  "Smoke!" Carol shouted. "The building’s on fire."

  Trapped!

  "Out the back way," Roger Brooks said. "Quick!" He crouched low and ran down the hallway to the stairs. "Stay low. Stay away from windows!"

  Nat Reynolds ran down the hall. He heard Carol behind him.

  * * *

  Roger sat in the biggest Cadillac in the lowest level of the underground parking structure. It was noon. They’d been here almost twenty hours.

  There were sounds from inside another Caddy two cars away. Jeez, what does she see in him? Roger wondered. They were at it not six hours after her live-in boyfriend bought it.

  And you’re jealous, because you had nothing to distract you from the thought that they’d tumble the building down on your head. Or from them—

  There hadn’t been any sounds from outside for hours. Roger couldn’t stand it any longer. He crept toward the exit. Another small group—a man, two women, and four small children—huddled in one corner of the garage. They stared at Roger as he went past, but they didn’t say anything.

  The ramp was blocked by debris, but the stairs were intact. Roger climbed up, pausing at each landing.

  "Ho."

  He jumped, startled. The voice had been feminine and definitely human. "Hello."