The mysterious young woman was standing with the other passengers, her book in one arm, eyes pointed in the general direction of the unloading.
“Which is yours?” Jopale asked.
She didn’t seem to hear the question. Then he realized that her gaze reached past the mockmen, bright tan eyes staring at the night lands, her mind probably traveling on to her destination.
“Good Mountain, is it?” Jopale asked.
“I’m sorry, no.” She was answering his first question, smiling in his general direction. “I don’t own any of these creatures.”
Jopale had brought a mockman from home, to help with his bags and his life, as well as giving him this ready excuse to stand where he was, chatting with this young woman.
With a quiet, gentlemanly voice, he offered his name.
She nodded and said, “Yes. Good Mountain.”
They had found a pattern. He would ask some little question, and she would answer his former question.
“The word ‘mountain’,” he said. “Do you know what it means?”
She smiled now, glancing at his face. “Do you?”
He allowed himself the pleasure of a wise nod. “It is an ancient word,” he answered. “The oldest texts employ it. But even by then, the word had fallen into a rotten disuse.”
“Really?”
“We have words for ridges and hills. With great clarity, we can describe the color and quality of any ground. But from what we can determine, using our oldest sources, ‘mountain’ implies a titanic uplifting of something much harder than any wood. Harder and more durable, and a true mountain rises high enough to puncture the sky. At least according to some expert interpretations.”
She laughed, very softly. “I know.”
“Do you?”
“That’s why they picked the name,” she explained.
Jopale didn’t understand, and his expression must have said as much.
“Of course, there’s no actual mountain there,” she admitted. “It’s just a flat plain shoved high by a set of faults and buoyant substrates. But there was a time, long ago, when the Continent pushed in from every side, and an entire island was buried. Buried and carried a long ways under the sea.”
The woman liked to explain things. Was she a teacher?
“Interesting,” Jopale offered, though he wasn’t convinced that it was.
“That island is like a mountain in reverse, you see. It extends a long ways below the waterline. Like a fist sticking out from the bottom of the Continent, reaching deeper into our ocean than any other feature we know of.”
“I see,” he muttered.
But why she would call it, “Our ocean”? How many oceans were there?
“That’s why the science station was built there,” she explained. “‘A good mountain to do research.’ That what my colleagues used to joke.”
“What kind of research?” he asked.
“Land distortions and water cycles, mostly. And various experts who work with that submerged ground.”
He said, “Really?” with a false enthusiasm.
The woman nodded, returning to her distant stare.
“Is that your specialty?” he asked, trying to read the binding of her book. “Prehistoric islands?”
“Oh, no.” She passed the heavy book to her other arm.
“Then what do you do?”
It was an exceptionally reasonable question, but she was a peculiar creature. Smiling as if nothing had ever been funnier, she said, “Do-ane.” She wasn’t quite looking at his face, telling him, “That is my name.”
He didn’t have a ready response.
“You told me yours. I assumed you wanted to know mine.”
“Thank you,” Jopale muttered.
“I’m sorry, but I can’t say anything else.”
He nodded and shrugged. And then his mockman emerged from the stomach: A mature female with big blue eyes riding high on her broad stoic face. Jopale had recently purchased her from a cousin, replacing the mockmen he had lost when the valley flooded. For her species, she was smart and adaptable. By any standard, she was loyal, and in countless domestic tasks, she was helpful. And like every passenger from the worm’s stomach, she smelled of acid and other unpleasant secretions. But at least this creature didn’t want to play word games, or dance silly secrets before his eyes.
Jopale spoke to one of the soldiers, proving his ownership to everyone’s satisfaction.
“My bags,” he ordered.
The creature snatched each by its rope handle.
“This way,” he said. Then with a minimal nod, he excused himself from Do-ane, pushing through the station, searching for some place where the noble refugee might eat a fit meal.
PARANOIA
Dining halls next to worm stations were rarely elegant. World’s Edge was an exception: Using the local wood, artisans had carved long blocks into a series of omega-shaped beams, each a little different from the others, all linked like ribs to form a single long room. Woven gyre-tree branches created a porous roof. Heavy planks had been bleached white and laid out for a floor, each fastened to the foundation with solid pins made of dense black knot-wood. The tables and chairs were brightly colored, orange and gold predominating, everything made from slick new plastics—one of those expensive programs underwritten by some well-meaning government agency, public moneys helping lock away a few breaths of methane into this more permanent form. The usual indoor epiphytes clung to the overhead beams—vigorous plants with dark leaves that thrived in the artificial light, their finger-like roots drinking nothing but the travelers’ nervous breathing. Jopale noticed a familiar figure planted at one end of a busy table, accompanied by two mockmen that sat backwards on turned-around chairs, eating their rations off their laps—a common custom in many places.
“May I join you?” asked Jopale.
“Please.” The man was tall even when he was sitting, and unlike practically everyone else in the place, he wasn’t eating. His old map was opened up before him, and with long fingers and sharpened nails, he measured and remeasured the distances between here and Port of Krauss.
Jopale set down his platter and handed his mockman two fresh rations of syrup-and-roach. The big female settled on the floor, legs crossed, hands and mind focused on the screw-style lids on both wooden jars.
Unsure what to say, Jopale said nothing. But silence proved uncomfortable, which was why he eventually picked the most obvious topic. “So why are you going to Port of Krauss?”
The thin man glanced up for a moment, apparently startled.
“You are going there, aren’t you?”
“No.”
“I’m sorry then,” said Jopale. “I just assumed—”
“My trip doesn’t end there,” the thin man continued. “I have business, of a kind … business in another place…”
“The New Isles?”
Surprise turned to pleasure. “Are you going there too?”
Jopale nodded.
“Well, good. I knew there had to be others. Wonderful!”
Somehow that revelation didn’t bring comfort. Jopale had the impression that his companion was difficult, and the idea of traveling with him across the rest of the Continent and then out over the Ocean felt daunting, if not out and out unpleasant.
“I need somebody to keep my confidence up,” the tall man proclaimed.
What did confidence have to do with anything?
“My name is Rit.”
“Jopale.”
Rit didn’t seem to hear him. Glancing over his shoulder, he observed, “There aren’t any people working in the kitchen. Did you notice?”
Only mockmen were cooking and washing dishes. There wasn’t even an overseer walking among them, keeping order.
“I don’t know if I could make myself go to work,” Jopale admitted. “All that’s happening, even if it’s far from here—”
“Not that far away,” Rit interrupted.
“What? Has the news changed?”
“Aren’t things awful enough as they are?” The tall man shuddered, then steered clear of that dangerous subject. He licked his lips and stared down at the big map, fingers stretched wide. Then with a tight voice, he asked the lines and tiny dots, “You do believe in the Isles, don’t you?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
The narrow face twisted. “But have you ever seen the Isles? Or do you know anyone who’s actually visited them?”
Jopale had never considered the possibility. “What do you mean? How could they not exist?” He immediately reached for the only book in his personal satchel—a leather-bound, professionally printed volume full of photographs and exhaustive explanations. With his voice rising, he said, “I haven’t heard anything like that. Not even the rumor of a rumor.”
Rit shook his head and began to fold up his map, saying to no one in particular, “I’m sorry. I have these panics. Always have.”
The man was insane, or nearly so.
“It’s just that in times like these…” Rit took a moment to compose himself. “When disaster reigns, deceitful souls prosper. Have you noticed? Criminals rise up like worms inside dead wood. They come from below to hurt good people, for profit and for fun.”
There was an obvious, ominous counter to that logic. “We’ve never seen times as bad as these,” Jopale said.
That observation earned a terrified but respectful look from his companion. “I suppose that’s so.”
“Why go to so much trouble to mislead us? With the worst happening, in far off places now and maybe here soon … even a despicable thief knows he wouldn’t have enough time to enjoy his money…”
“Unless he doesn’t believe he will die.” Rit leaned across the table, putting his bony face close to Jopale’s face. “Most people still don’t appreciate their mortality. They read about the deaths of strangers. Places they don’t know are poisoned or burning. But until their lungs are sick and their skin is cooking, they think their chances are exceptionally good.”
There were stubborn souls in the world, yes. Jopale knew a history teacher—a brilliant man by any measure—who had openly mocked him. “Nothing ever changes in the world,” the colleague had claimed. “The Continent will shatter here and there, and some old islands will be destroyed. But others islands will survive, along with the people riding them. That is the irrefutable lesson of our past, Jopale. Our world is tough, our species is lucky, and both will survive every onslaught.”
Jopale nodded for a moment, as if accepting that remembered lecture. Then with an honest conviction, he reminded Rit, “There are easier and much cheaper ways to fool people. And steal a fortune in the process, I might add.”
His companion gave a grudging nod.
“I am like you,” Jopale continued, knowing that he wasn’t anything like this crazy fellow. “I’ve had some suspicions, yes. I wanted to know: Were the New Isles really as strong and smartly designed as their builders claim them to be? So I made inquiries before committing my money. And yes, the New Isles do exist. They were built at the Port of Krauss, at the main shipyard. The last Isle was launched just a year ago, and it’s still being towed to its final destination. I even spoke to workers at the Port, using a radiophone. And while they couldn’t promise that the Isles were located in safe places, or that I had an open berth waiting for me and my mockman, they were definite about one issue: They had done their best work, fabricating the largest, strongest ships humans had ever known.”
Jopale glanced at the cover of his book. From the bluffs overlooking the unlit ocean, someone had taken a photograph showing a wide vessel built from tough old wood. Some of the strongest, most enduring land in the world had been cut free of the Continent and floated into position, then carved into a cumbersome but durable ensemble of hulls and empty chambers. And to make the Isle even stronger, a fortune in refined metals had been fashioned into cables and struts and long nails that were fixed throughout the Isle’s body. Metal was what Port of Krauss was famous for—the rare elements that could be filtered from the cold dark seawater. With the best alloys in the world, insulated tanks were built, and they were filled with methane and dangled far beneath each Isle, using the sea’s own pressure and cold to help keep the gas liquefied. That gas would eventually power lights and hydroponics, with enough energy in reserve to tear the seawater apart … to carve hydrogen from the precious oxygen, allowing everyone to breathe without any cumbersome masks.
With the surety of a good teacher, Jopale dismissed Rit’s concerns. “These are genuine sanctuaries, and my new home is waiting for me. I just have to get there now. And I feel quite sure that I will.”
Saying those words, he believed them.
Rit seemed to take it all to heart. He put away his map and found his own copy of the member’s handbook, opening it to one of his favorite pages.
Finally, Jopale began to eat his meal. He had purchased two scrambler hands, fried but not too greasy, and a whitish lump of sweetcake and cultured algae in a salty soup, all washed down with a tall bottle of fermented sap imported from the Earlands. The drink was the most expensive item on the limited menu, and it was the most appreciated. The hard kick of the liquor was already working on his mood when his companion spoke again, using a sorry little voice to ask, “But what if?”
“What if what?” Jopale responded testily.
“What if these thieves and con artists did believe this world was coming to an end? And by promising berths to us and maybe a million others like us, they earned enough money to finance their own salvation.”
Jopale grimaced, breathing through his teeth.
“What if a New Isle is waiting, but not for us?” Rit persisted.
Jopale felt a smile emerge on its own. Then with a bitter laugh, he told his traveling companion, “Well then. Then we aren’t in any worse shape than the rest of the world. Now are we?”
ON AGAIN
Jopale had always excelled at school, including respectable grades earned in each of the three sciences. But he never achieved a profound understanding of genetics or selective forces. He learned what was absolutely necessary, relying on his clear memory when it came to the standard exams. Introductory classes demanded little else, while the high-level courses—those rarefied environments where professors wanted more than disgorged fact and holy equations—had never been in his future.
But one lesson Jopale took from science was this: Mockmen were wondrous creatures, pliable and creative by every genetic measure.
A glance around the station proved that truism. Most of the mockmen were big creatures, two or three times larger than a grown human. They had been bred for compliance and power when necessary and a minimal metabolism to help reduce the food bills. Yet some of these creatures were small and slender as a child. And a few of the kitchen workers were quicker than any human being—a blessing in this hurly-burly business. What’s more, no two of them could be confused for each other, even though they might be siblings or a parent and grown child. All had an oval face and a protruding chin beneath a small, seemingly inadequate mouth. Yet each face was unique. Jopale’s own girl had descended from giants that lived for generations on his family farm—a generalist by design and by training, her head topped with beastly red hair, a dramatic chin hanging from the parabolic jaw, and blue inhuman eyes gazing out at a world full of motion and incomprehensible purpose. If the creature had a voice, she would have commanded a vocabulary of several hundred easy words. But of course the larynx was pierced when she was a baby, leaving her able to communicate only with simple gestures and vaguely human expressions. A creature of habit and duty, his mockman was too simple to understand the dire state of the world—an ignorance that Jopale couldn’t help but envy, at least now and again.
“Everything with a spine arose from a common ancestor,” he had learned long ago. His biology professor—an ancient woman blessed with her own sturdy backbone—explained to the class, “A single creature must have been the originator of us all. On some ancient continen
t, long dead and rotted away, this precursor to humans ran about on two legs, climbing up into the saprophytes and epiphytes, grabbing what food it could with its primitive hands.”
“Like a scrambler?” a student had asked.
Jopale didn’t ask the question, thankfully. The professor reacted with a click of the tongue and a sorry shake of her head. “Hardly,” she replied. “Scramblers are as far removed from our founding species as we are. As the mockmen are. Flying yabbers, copper eels, plus everything else you can name … all of these species would look at that vanished organism as being its very distant ancestor. That is, if simple beasts could ever think in such abstract terms.”
“But where did the first vertebrates come from?” another student inquired. “From the sea? Or from some earlier continent?”
“Nobody knows,” the professor replied. Then with the surety of age, she added, “And nobody will ever discover that unnecessary answer. Since there’s no way to study the matter any farther than it has been studied by now.”
* * *
Jopale had been sitting in the station for several hours, changing position as the plastic chair pushed against his rump. At that moment, he happened to be thinking about his biology teacher, long dead, and about the nature of surety. And to stave off boredom, he was studying the astonishing diversity of false humans who sat and walked among those who were real.
Suddenly a short, homely mockman entered the dining hall. It was female, dressed in the stiff uniform of a station worker. And like with a few of her species, some quirk of genetics had swollen her skull, giving her a genuine forehead under a cap of thick black hair. That forehead was remarkable enough. But then the newcomer opened her mouth, revealing a clear and exceptionally strong voice.
The Very Best of the Best Page 21
