by Ben Bova
“I see.” Adela nodded, considering the news. “I’m disappointed, of course; I was truly looking forward to meeting her, and her input will be missed, but it shouldn’t pose too much of a problem as far as what we’re doing here is concerned. And if Billy still needs her help, then that’s the best place for her to be. But why hasn’t she told your father? He’s counting on her being here.”
“She’s afraid to,” Lewis offered. “Father’s concerned with her safety, as he is for all of us, and was counting on us all being together. ‘Strength in numbers.’ She knows that and doesn’t want to worry him unduly. And …” He paused and looked at Brendan.
“And she’s fallen in love with Billy,” his brother finished. “She doesn’t want to leave him.”
“Oh.”
An unexpected emotional rush shot through her that she couldn’t understand. What is it I’m feeling right now? she demanded of herself. Why am I reacting like this? Privately, her thoughts were spinning, but aloud she asked, “What’s wrong with that? Billy is your father’s closest and dearest friend; surely she doesn’t think—you don’t think—he’ll disapprove?”
“No, but …” Brendan shrugged. “It’s the timing of all of this. She’s afraid Father will think she’s putting her own needs ahead of what’s happening here, ahead of what he’s asked us all to do.”
Of course she’s afraid, Adela reasoned. She’s being presented with the same decision I was when I chose to go into cryosleep: her own happiness, or her goals.
“Timing be damned.” Adela smiled inwardly. It felt good. “She’s made the right choice.”
She spoke a while longer to the two men, but directly all three went about their separate tasks. Hours later, back aboard the Kiska, she attempted to reach Billy with no success. He and Cathay were in the bush, she was informed, and would not, in fact, be available until long after the jamming net was in place.
Adela sat alone in her cabin and enjoyed the quiet, wondering if the IPC agent on duty was even now being told of his or her new status. She hoped so.
The hour grew late and she yawned, stretching out on the comfortable sofa as she thought back over the day’s affairs, trying to sort out her feelings. As pleased as she was with the turn of events enabling them to silence Jephthah for the time being, and of the welcome change in the status of the deathguards, she found her thoughts drifting, unbidden, back to Billy, back to Earth.
“System,” she commanded softly, sitting up on the sofa and straightening her appearance.
“Ma’am?”
“Prepare to record a message for out-system delivery.”
The room lights increased to a level sufficient for a clear recording as she sat in the chair before the holoframe in the corner. A tiny red light glowed faintly above the pickup lens.
“Ready to record, on your signal.”
She cleared her throat softly. “Go.” A confirming chirp told her the recording had started.
“Hello, Billy,” she began, uncertain of exactly what it was she needed to say. “I’m sure you will have talked to Eric about everything that’s happened here by the time you receive this, so I won’t go into it now. I just wanted you to know that I’m pleased to hear how well things are progressing there. I’d be less than honest if I said your presence here wasn’t missed—there’s so much to see here, so much I’d like to share with you! The people I’m working with on the Paloma Blanca, they … well, they understand the same thing about our goals here as you do there in the outback. I know what you’re doing there at Kimberley is so very important, not only to you, but to the proper order of things. I suppose I’ve always known it, but I think it’s only since I’ve been here, and have seen how these people hold valuable the same things you and I do … that I’ve realized how much what you’re doing means to you.
“I’ve also recognized that what you’re doing there is so very similar to what’s happening to the Empire. I know you’re struggling to have your people hold on to the best of their old ways at the same time they move into a very different future. The difference between our situations is that your people see it all so clearly; I truly wonder if the people scattered among the Hundred Worlds will be so fortunate.”
Adela hesitated, carefully forming her words.
“I know about Cathay’s decision, Billy.” Another pause. “Don’t worry about Eric’s reaction to her staying there with you. You know him as well as I do, better than I do. He’s a good man, a reasonable man; and he’ll understand. He’ll worry about you both … .” She smiled reassuringly into the lens. “But nothing would please him more than the two of you being together. I know it pleases me. She’s a lucky woman, Billy; very lucky. I’m so happy for you. For both of you. Good luck.”
Adela ended the recording, addressed it and encoded it for immediate transmission. “System, please bring lights to thirty percent,” she said, moving back to the sofa. She sat there, unmoving, hands folded in her lap.
I am happy for him, she thought. I truly meant it when I said it.
She lay back on the sofa, resting the back of her arm on her forehead. She was happy for Billy. Helping the Aborigine to restore their faith, to “reconnect their Song Lines,” as he had put it, was the realization of his fondest dream. And the thought he and Cathay were in love sent a profound sense of family through her very being, along with the awareness that the union would bring her closer to both of them.
But why did she suddenly feel so all alone?
23
FRIENDS, THROUGH ALL
“You are not our enemies,” Eric insisted. The Emperor of the Hundred Worlds stood on a tiny island of solid ground jutting out of the water amid a lush, misty jungle that was more swamp than forest. An enormous insect more closely resembling a dragon than did its Earthly namesake buzzed curiously around him, then flew into his chest only to reappear, confused and disoriented, out the other side of his holographic image before disappearing into the distance. “I am as concerned with Jephthah’s crazed propaganda as you must be, and desire nothing so much as to see it ended, once and for all. Will you help us with this?”
“We were your enemy once.” The Sarpan known as S’Senoh, Guardian of the Waters, swam closer to Eric, raising himself to a sitting position waist-deep in the murky pool. He idly played his webbed fingers across the surface of the water at his sides, nictitating membranes blinking in Eric’s direction. The dark brown, leathery skin of his forehead wrinkled oddly with each blink. “Could we not be your enemy again?”
“You were our enemies many, many years ago,” Eric admitted. “But that was a darker time when both our races had just begun venturing into space. Our races were young, inexperienced, and easily frightened by what we found as we moved out among the stars. Had our paths crossed at a later time, perhaps the blood spilled between us could have been avoided.”
“But the blood was spilled; it is mixed here in the water with me now.” As if to demonstrate, S’Senoh dipped cupped hands beneath the surface and lifted the water to Eric as it seeped through his fingers. “Do you not see it?”
“I know. The blood of my forefathers is a part of my history, too.”
“So?” S’Senoh asked. “Could this spilled blood not bring about the same …” He stopped, his mouth moving silently as he tried to form the right word. “ … animosity … between us, now that it has been fed by the Human-Prophet?”
“The man is not a prophet!” Eric replied, frustrated. “He is little more than a selfish opportunist, and speaks for no one other than himself. Can you not see that?”
S’Senoh sighed, expelling the air heavily through his nostrils. “Can you not see that individuality is as alien to us as a dry nest?”
“You are wise, Guardian,” Eric acceded, “to recognize and understand this difference between our people. I ask forgiveness for my outburst.”
The alien nodded, accepting the Emperor’s apology. “However, my query remains: We have been blamed by Jephthah for all manner of atrocities. The lost
human colony at Zephyr; the burning of a city on 82-Delta; and my ears still burn with human voices crying out ‘Remember the Sylvan!’”
“I know you were not responsible for these acts, and have done my best to correct the record in your behalf.”
“And still, many humans believe. I ask yet again, Emperor of the Human Worlds: We were your enemy once; could not … Jephthah’s …” Again, he struggled for a word of the proper context. “Could not his ‘propaganda’ turn humanity against us again? Could not more blood join me in this water?”
Eric regarded S’Senoh carefully. Although the elder leader did his best to downplay his fear, he was truly concerned with what might happen should a united humanity turn against the Sarpan. And why shouldn’t he be afraid? Humanity had, after all, almost wiped out his race centuries earlier during the First Contact Wars that had raged between their races.
“But we were a different people then,” he said. “Both of us, humanity and Sarpan. We conceitedly thought of ourselves as Terrans then, and had settled far fewer than a hundred worlds. We were eager to extend humanity wherever we could, and to let nothing stop us from doing so. You called yourself Rak in those days, and your only goal was to spread out among the stars, to increase the size of your water at all costs. You looked down upon any life you found, and considered it beneath you—just as we did.” Eric shook his head in genuine sadness at the history. “Both our peoples were stupid, shortsighted.” Eric sat on the mound, pulling his knees up before him as he leaned closer to S’Senoh. “We have both matured.”
The Guardian looked away, considering everything Eric had said. High in the misty sky behind him, the lowermost of his world’s twin suns began to dip below the tree line. As it did, Eric noticed all around him that the sounds of myriad animals and insects had grown stronger, louder as they prepared to great the approaching night.
“So.” S’Senoh, his decision made, turned back to him again and nodded. His head tilted in a posture of assent, the setting suns glinted off the nine silver bobs on his left gill slit. “I accept your offer to strengthen our alliance in this cause. I will contact Captain Tra’tiss personally and instruct him to cooperate fully with your male spawn Lewis Wood.”
“Thank you,” Eric said simply. “I believe that united in this, humanity and Sarpan can show to one and all that this man’s hatred is unfounded, and that he is to be shunned.”
“Let us hope so.” S’Senoh hesitated, and seemed to concentrate on something unseen below the surface of the pool. “May I ask something in return?”
“Of course.”
“She who will rebirth the star of your homeworld is near the Cra Stuith, is this not so?”
“Yes. Adela de Montgarde is there.”
“So.” The Guardian seemed uncertain, as if he was self-conscious about what he wanted to ask. “I am correct in thinking that she is from the same water group as Lewis Wood and yourself?”
“Yes. She is my mother, and the grandmother of both Commander Wood and Academician Wood.”
S’Senoh nodded, pleased that his information was correct. “Captain Tra’tiss will spawn soon. It is his wish to meet with her for first touching. Would this be possible?”
Eric considered the request with absolute earnestness. Much of what the Sarpan were, as a race, was passed on through touch, father to spawn. Knowledge, instincts, a sense of unity, and many more things less tangible passed in that way from one generation to the next. Only under the rarest of circumstances had the Sarpan allowed a human to touch their spawn, only rarely had they considered a human to be of such importance as to want their young to be imprinted with their thoughts.
“I cannot speak for she who is my mother, nor can I command her in this. As you noted earlier, humanity is a race of individuals, each in charge of his or her own destiny. However,” he said, “knowing her as I do, I am certain that she would consider it an honor to share first touching with your captain’s spawn. I will speak to her of it.”
“This one is most grateful.” The Guardian stood, water dripping noisily from his naked body. Eric had been surprised at the alien’s age when he first noted the number of silver bobs he proudly displayed, but it wasn’t until now, with S’Senoh wading slowly toward him, that he realized just how old and frail the Sarpan leader truly was. He was thin, almost emaciated, and was clearly long past bequeathing his Guardianship to another. Eric rose, regarding the old one with a renewed respect. “Perhaps one day, when this present difficulty is ended, we, too, shall touch.”
S’Senoh stopped before him and extended his hand, palm toward him, in the ritual of touching. Eric responded in kind and held his own palm against the alien’s.
Their palms did not truly touch in this holographic setting. The symbolic gesture would have to suffice, for now.
S’Senoh said a few words softly in his native tongue, and the misty swamp dissolved around Eric, leaving a dimly lighted holographic display chamber. It was foolish, Eric knew, since he was never on the Sarpan homeworld, but the room suddenly felt colder.
You are a wise leader, he thought, alone once more in the vast, empty display chamber. Maybe someday you and I will meet. I would consider a touching with you to be a great honor indeed.
24
SURPRISES
The dome at South Camp was in an uproar. A torrential downpour had sprung up almost without warning, catching the surface teams by surprise. It was all they could do to move as much delicate equipment into the dome as possible, while covering the rest with plastic tarps. All around Adela there were people running, shouting, and trying to do a hundred things at once.
The fact that the weather change was a surprise was not entirely true, however. The meteorological data from any one of a dozen ships orbiting the planet were available, but with the activity both on and above Tsing IV increasing on a daily basis, the information never managed to find its way to the officer of the day at the dome. Even now, Adela could hear the OD bellowing on the far side of the dome as he corralled yet another equipment-laden transport in from the storm.
“I’ve found it, all right.” Vito Secchi’s image beamed from his portion of the holoframe, his shaggy growth of beard bobbing animatedly as he spoke. “The probe’s on its way, but I want to get down there and check it out myself as soon as possible. It’s about five hundred meters down, but it’s definitely the source of the metal we found at South Camp. And there’s more of it. A lot more of it.”
“Please, Vito. One thing at a time.” Gareth Anmoore, standing at Adela’s side, raised a hand to slow the energetic geologist down. “You’ll have to excuse Dr. Secchi, but I share in his enthusiasm. I think this is what we’ve been looking for.”
“But how is it that you’ve just now located it?” Brendan asked. “I understood that both moons had already been thoroughly scanned.”
“They were. Dr. Secchi did two complete orbital surveys. I personally reviewed his findings.” A pleasant grin spread across his face. “However, Vito has a tendency not to give up when he’s convinced of something. Geologically speaking.”
Adela felt someone brush lightly against her back, and was not surprised to see that a small crowd of combined personnel from the Kiska and Paloma Blanca, as well as from other ships that had sent specialists down, had gathered behind her and Anmoore to learn whatever they could of this latest news.
The holoframe seemed nearly as crowded as the dome. Unlike the fully equipped holoconference room aboard the Scartaris, the frame installed at South Camp was fairly basic and little better than a large, wall-mounted flatscreen. Vito’s transmission from the survey ship in orbit occupied the left third of the frame, while Brendan and Lewis shared the rightmost portion. An orbital shot of the surface of Big One, the two-dimensional picture centered on a series of overlapping craters, filled the middle portion. Telemetry numbers scrolled along the bottom of the center image, which appeared—as the probe sending back the picture continued to lower itself gently to the surface—to be gradually zooming in
on the largest of the craters.
“Captain Anmoore’s right,” Secchi verified. “We scanned both of them, top to bottom. Problem was … we weren’t meant to find it.”
The was a sudden hush among those who had gathered to listen in to the holoframe, then a steady rising of soft voices anxious to offer thoughts and opinions among themselves about what the geologist had just said. The three-way link was confusing enough, but the clamor of personnel still coming and going in the dome’s main chamber, the raging storm outside, and the growing crowd around them all contributed to make the conversation even more difficult to follow.
“The whole deposit is shielded,” he went on. “From most angles, we read nothing but loose regolith or solid rock, which is the reading anyone scanning Big One was supposed to get, I think, either from orbit or a planet-based observation point.”
Lewis rubbed at his temples. “I’m not sure I follow this. Are you saying that whatever this metal deposit is, it’s being deliberately hidden?”
An unassuming why-didn’t-I-think-of-that look spread over Secchi’s face. “Uh, I hadn’t really thought it out that far … I’ve just been mainly concerning myself with trying to get some measurement of the extent of the deposit and its exact location below the surface. I never really stopped to think about why it wasn’t readable.” Someone leaned into his portion of the image and tapped at his shoulder, and Vito nodded. “Oh, I can give you the playback now. We have a few minutes before the probe touches down anyway.”
The center of the holoframe blinked, the display switching to a sweeping overhead view taken from one of the many sensorsats in orbit around it. The surface zipped along, giving the same view one might see of the ground from a standard aircraft, except that in this recording dots and smears of color appeared and disappeared as various ore and mineral deposits came within range of the spectrographic equipment on the satellite. A sequence of numbers sprang into the image at each occurrence.
