There was no point in constructing theories. I had no real information. I did my yoga, then meditated, looking at the smoke.
Dinner was a piece of fruit. I slept badly, troubled by indigestion.
The morning was overcast. I could feel rain in the air. Damn! I looked east. There was no sign of the other fire. Maybe they had let it go out overnight. Maybe the smoke was invisible against the low gray sky.
I checked my trap—it was empty again—dug up the biped and used another piece for bait. Then I checked my menstrual pad. No sign of blood. I ought to be able to swim across the river. I took the pad off and buried it and then rebuilt my fire.
Midway through the morning, the rain began. It was fine and misty. My fire kept burning, but who was going to see it? The eastern shore of the river was dim. I cursed whoever was in charge of the weather. The four winds. Those unruly men! I prayed to Guan Yin, though I didn’t remember that she had anything to do with meteorology, and I asked the Mother of Mothers to straighten out her grandsons.
“And do something about the Little Bug Spirit, if you can.”
Maybe I was getting a little crazy. I didn’t usually talk to spirits. My stomach grumbled. I decided the fruit was the problem. I needed meat or a vegetable. I drank a little water and checked my trap. The bait was still there.
At noon the boat came into view: a launch with a cabin and good-sized engine. It was moving slowly upriver through the rain.
I put on my jeans and gathered my belongings: the knife, the lighter, my half-unraveled sock. I ought to put the fire out. But how? It was pretty big. I’d let the others worry about it. I went down to the shore and waved and shouted.
The person at the stern waved in reply. The boat turned toward me. I waded into the water.
The person was dressed in olive-green. A member of the crew. In theory there were no uniforms on the ship. But the crewmembers tended to dress alike: olive-green denim pants and olive-green pullover sweaters, soft caps with brims, olive-green or black.
I waded farther out, right to the edge of the drop-off. The boat came in, moving increasingly slowly. Ivanova. I recognized her squat, broad body. I was being rescued by the chief pilot of the I.S.S.Number One.
Someone else came out of the cabin, taller than Ivanova and broader, dressed in jeans and a blue denim jacket. His shirt was red. His hair was long and black, worn loose. It flowed over his shoulders. Edward Antoine Whirlwind, Ph.D.
The boat stopped next to me. Eddie reached down and pulled me onboard. He hugged me. “Lixia! Are you all right?”
“Yeah.” I held on to him. I was shaking, and I felt as if my knees were going to give way.
“Get her inside,” said Ivanova. Her voice—as always—took me by surprise. It was a rich contralto, which ought to have belonged to an actress or a singer. “Tell Agopian to get out here. We need to do something about the fire.”
A moment later I was in the cabin. There was a carpet under my bare feet. Eddie helped me into a chair. I leaned back and felt the fabric through my shirt: a rough texture, most likely handmade.
My arms rested on the arms of the chair. I curled my fingers under and felt metal tubing. How long had it been since I had sat like this—up, off the ground, in a chair with a back? I did not remember.
Eddie leaned over me, looking concerned. There were other people behind him. A crewwoman with a Central Asian face. A crewman who looked vaguely Middle Eastern. A tall blond man in a pair of light-blue coveralls.
The blond man grinned at me and made the gesture that meant “welcome.”
Derek.
Eddie spoke to the crew people, and they left.
Derek said, “Are you okay?”
“Yes. Eddie, you’re looming.”
“Sorry.”
They sat down. I looked at Derek. “How are you? What happened? Do you know what happened to the others?”
He made the gesture that indicated lack of knowledge. “I ended by myself. You must have, too.”
“Yes.”
“I lost the boat as soon as it went over and caught hold of a tree that was hung up in the rapids.” He grinned. “There I was—in the middle of white water, holding on to this damn tree trunk and wondering what to do next. I saw no one. I have no idea what happened to the others.”
“What did you do?”
“It wasn’t a good place for swimming. I was pretty sure of that. And I haven’t had any experience with white-water swimming. I worked the tree free and floated out of the rapids.”
I made the gesture that meant “good” or “clever.”
“That’s what I thought until I found out how hard it is to steer a tree. Especially this one. It was very badly designed—for navigation, anyway. It may have done just fine in its previous line of work.” Derek glanced at Eddie. “I’ll tell you the rest later.”
Eddie leaned forward. “Are you certain that you’re all right, Lixia?”
“Nothing hurts. I have no injuries. I’m tired, and I’m going to want to eat pretty soon, but not at this moment.”
“Okay.” He stood. “I have to talk to Ivanova. There are decisions to be made, and she’ll make them on her own if I don’t get out there quickly. Derek, you take care of Lixia.”
“To hear is to obey.”
“Cut the crap.”
Eddie left the cabin. I looked around, seeing curved walls and oval windows. The carpet on the floor was a neutral color: gray or tan. All the furniture looked as if it folded or disassembled or turned into something else. The couches along the walls, for example. They obviously became beds. The little tables between them folded into the walls. Our chairs had hinges. I was in a home for nomads. It occurred to me that I was spending my entire life traveling.
“I have my orders,” Derek said. “What do you need? Or want?”
“Nothing yet. Give me a minute.”
He made the gesture of acquiescence.
I closed my eyes. Time passed. The sound of the engine changed. I opened my eyes and stood. The boat was moving away from my island. The beach—my beach—was empty. People had been there. I saw their footprints in the sand, and my fire was covered with yellow foam. The foam was melting in the rain, dripping off the branches and forming a pool of yellowish water. Blobs of foam floated in the pool.
Ugly!
We passed the tangle of driftwood, heading upstream toward the rapids.
“Where are we going?”
Derek made the gesture that indicated lack of knowledge.
The short man—Agopian—came into the cabin. He closed the door. “Ivanova has asked me to look after you. She is having an argument with Eddie.”
“About what?”
“Whether to look for your companions. Eddie says no, as you might expect. Ivanova says a cosmonaut does not refuse to look for people who might be alive and in trouble. In space we have only each other. What can I do for you?”
I made a decision. “Food.”
“We don’t have a proper kitchen. I can offer you a sandwich.”
“Okay.”
He crossed the cabin, aft to fore, and went through another door. A light went on, and I saw him crouching, looking into something: a cooling unit. “We have egg salad, caviar, onion and tomato, and something that claims to be chopped chicken liver on Russian black bread.”
I made the gesture of inquiry. He looked puzzled. I said, “What do you mean ‘claims’?”
“I am Armenian, and Armenians have long memories. I remember the taste of Russian black bread. We have given up a lot in order to go to the stars.”
True enough. I made the gesture of agreement.
“What do you want?” asked Agopian.
“The egg salad. Unless it’s on black bread.”
“Rye. Not great, but adequate. Do you want mineral water or beer? We also have the local water, distilled and free of everything that might do harm.”
“Mineral water.”
He brought the food out. The sandwich was wrapped in paper.
The water was in a glass bottle. “Please return to recycling” was stamped on the side. There was a chip in the bottom.
I opened the bottle. The water fizzed. I drank a little, then unwrapped the sandwich and took a bite. It was delicious. I forced myself to eat slowly, stopping after each bite to drink the water, which had—very faintly—the taste of a citrus fruit.
“Derek?” said Agopian.
“Nothing for me.”
The crewman went back into the galley and came out with another bottle. This one was amber rather than clear. Most likely, it held beer. He sat down, opening the bottle. For a while after that, there was silence. I was eating. Derek looked tired, content to do nothing. Agopian drank his beer.
“Of course, there are benefits,” he said at last.
“What?” asked Derek.
“To going to the stars. When I was a kid, I had two ambitions. To take part in a revolution and to walk on another planet in the light of another sun. I’ve achieved one ambition, and depending on how you define revolution, I may achieve the other. Meeting these people—the natives here—is going to change our history.”
I finished the sandwich and licked my fingers, then made the gesture of agreement.
“What does that mean?” asked Agopian.
Derek said, “Yes. Okay. I agree with you.”
“Your English is excellent,” I said.
He nodded. “I was in Detroit for two years—more like three—studying at the School for Labor History.”
“You’re a historian? And you’re on the crew?”
“I have a degree in—what would be the right translation? Computer science? Computer theory? Not computer engineering. I know how to work with the machines and I know a lot about the way they interact with humans. I don’t really know what goes on inside them.
“I also have a degree in history and a certificate that says I am competent to astrogate.”
“He’s a political officer,” said Derek.
“There is no such position on the I.S.S. One. I am a member of the astrogation team.”
Derek made the gesture of polite lack of conviction.
“I can imagine what that means,” Agopian said. He glanced at me. “I was a political officer. Three years onboard the Alexandra Kollontai. It’s a freighter that goes between Transfer Station One and the L-5 colonies. I’d better use the past tense. It was a freighter. It must have been recycled by now.” He paused for a moment. He was thinking about the passage of time, something we all did on the expedition. “But I am not a political officer any longer.”
“He gives classes on Marxist theory,” said Derek. “And on the history of class struggle.”
“On my own time,” said Agopian. “No one is required to attend.”
“A lot of the crewmembers go.”
“Why shouldn’t they? It’s no crime to study the ideas of Karl Marx. Not in this century and on this ship.”
I tried to think of a way to change the subject. Nothing came immediately to mind. The boat began to rock. Agopian stood up and looked out a window. “We’re going around the north end of your island, Lixia. Across the current and maybe a little too close to the rapids. I like ships that go through space. These little things that travel on water make me nervous. But Ivanova is good.”
Eddie came in, ducking through the cabin doorway. It was too low for him and almost too narrow. “We’re going to look for Nia and the oracle.”
“Good,” said Derek.
Eddie shrugged. “I’m getting used to losing arguments. I feel like the old chiefs and medicine men who told the Europeans, ‘You’re making a mistake. You can’t treat the Earth like this.’ They were right. It only took two hundred years for everyone to see it.”
“He’s angry,” said Derek.
“Of course I am.” He went to the kitchen and got a bottle of mineral water. “We’re going to cross the river and go down the west side—slowly. We won’t reach camp till evening.” He opened the bottle and sat down, stretching out his legs. The mineral water was gone in two gulps. He set the bottle down.
I wanted no part of his anger or of whatever game Derek was playing with Agopian. My head itched. “I need a shower.”
“We have a portable shower,” Agopian said. “But we can’t set it up onboard the ship.”
“Boat,” said Derek.
I said, “Do you have a bathroom? And a sponge?”
“Across from the kitchen. You ought to find everything you need.”
I made the gesture of gratitude, got up, and went to the bathroom.
The toilet filled half of it. A cabinet was set into the opposite wall. I slid it open and—as promised—found everything I needed: soap in a bottle, a toothbrush, a comb, a pile of neatly folded coveralls, a sponge. The sponge was genuine and had once been alive, most likely on the ship.
The soap was peppermint. The label said it could be used on body, hair, teeth, and clothing, but should not be swallowed or otherwise eaten.
I stripped and washed all over—not easy to do in the tiny space. By the time I finished, there was water everywhere. I brushed my teeth and combed my wet hair, dried myself and the room, then smiled at my reflection. Not bad, though I looked a little thin and a little too pale. I needed makeup and a pair of earrings.
Ah, yes! And clothing. I put on coveralls, size small, blue, the color of peace and unity. It wasn’t my favorite color, but the only other option was olive drab.
That was it, except for lifting the basin back into the wall above the toilet, turning off the fan and going out to the main cabin. The three men glanced at me. Curious, to feel again the tension between men and women. “What do I do with my old clothes?”
“Do you want them back?” asked Agopian.
“Never.”
“There’s a recycling box in the kitchen. Put them there.”
I did and said, “I’m going out on deck. It’s too—” I hesitated.
“Close in here,” said Derek.
I made the gesture of agreement and opened the door.
It was still raining. An overhang protected the deck. Ivanova sat in a tall chair, which enabled her to see over the cabin roof. Her hands rested on the steering wheel. They were broad and blunt-fingered, strong-looking, even at rest. A wiping blade went across the window in front of her. Snick. Pause. Snick.
Ivanova glanced at me, nodded, then glanced at the crewwoman. “This is Li Lixia of the sociology team. Lixia, this is Tatiana Valikhanova.”
“Of the auxiliary transportation maintenance team,” the woman said.
We shook. I looked around. The boat had turned and was moving south. The western shore was on my right, low and gray, a mixture of forest and marsh. To my left were islands: clumps of trees, rising out of the water.
“Watch for smoke,” said Ivanova. “That is how we spotted you and Derek.”
“In this?” I asked.
“The weather is unfortunate.”
I made the gesture of acknowledgment.
The boat continued downriver. After a while Tatiana spoke in Russian. Ivanova turned the wheel. The boat turned toward a long island covered with bushes. There were white spots on the bushes, which became a flock of birds. They flew up as we approached. Tatiana scanned the island with binoculars. “Nothing,” she said in English. The boat turned again, out into the channel. The rain was getting heavier. Raindrops pocked the surface of the water, and the shore was barely visible.
“This is really bad,” I said.
“We’ll try again in two or three days,” Ivanova said. “We will be traveling this way. The nearest village is north of here on a tributary of this river.”
I stared at her. “You’re going to visit a village?”
“Yes.”
“You must have had the meeting.”
“On the problem of intervention? Yes.”
“What happened?”
Ivanova laughed. “What do you expect? You and Derek had vanished. We could not reach you by radio. People wan
ted to look for you. Eddie said no. It was too risky. The precedent was too dangerous. We had to adhere to his ridiculous—what do you call it?”
I frowned, looking toward the shore. It was a gray line now. “Do you mean the policy of nonintervention?”
“No. It is a term invented by writers. American writers, I think. Prime something.”
I grinned. “The Prime Directive.”
“Agopian told me about it. He is full of information about America and science fiction.”
“So you decided to look for us. Believe me, I am grateful. But why the village? Why are you going there?”
“Eddie said no. I said—the crew said—this is crazy. We can’t leave people in trouble. We can’t let other humans die. Eddie kept pounding at the danger of the precedent. I don’t understand him. I am from the Chukotka National District. Do you know where that is?”
“No.”
“Siberia, as far east and north as anyone can go and still be on the continent of Asia. Most of my ancestors were ethnic Russians. But no one in Siberia is entirely one thing. I have ancestors who were Chukchi and Inuit. I know what happened to the Small Peoples, the original natives, for good and for bad. We learned it in school.
“That’s over. We can’t undo it, and we can’t stop history. We can only act more carefully, more thoughtfully, with more respect and less greed.” She paused. “We can only act like socialists.”
I thought for a moment. “I don’t understand what this has to do with being here.”
“It was a deadlock,” said Tatiana. “No one wanted to leave you on the planet. But there are a lot of people on the ship from Asia and Africa and Latin America. They remember the stories they learned in school. Comrade Ivanova is from Siberia. I am from Kazakhstan. From the Kazakh A.S.S.R. I know what happened to our good pastureland when the Russians—the Soviet Russians—came.”
“What?” I asked.
“Plowed up. Gone. We had to pasture our herds in the dry land—the desert—or the mountains.” The woman lifted her binoculars. “Comrade, could you bring us closer to the shore?”
“Yes.” Ivanova turned the wheel. The boat turned toward the rainy marsh: gray reeds, bent under the weight of water. They moved gently in the wind. “As Tatiana says, it was a deadlock. We sat and glared at one another. Until the Chinese said it was not our problem.”
A Woman of the Iron People Page 35
